Out of the Darkness
by Scribbler
Summary: During the fall of Radiant Garden, things go badly wrong when Leon is left scarred and blinded. Now he must learn to live without his sight, but can a proud warrior ever settle for a life without fighting, or accept help from others? Pairings pending.
1. Cid: Promise

**Disclaimer****:** Bloodily not mine.

**A/N: **Originally written as a second entry for the KH Drabble Challenge 'darkness'. This one had expanded itself into several interconnected drabbles about an alternative end to Radiant Garden, however. Apparently there is more mileage in torturing Squall/Leon than I realised when I first started writing this. We'll see where it goes, shall we?

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><p><em><strong>Out of the Darkness<strong>_

© Scribbler, June 2011.

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><p><strong>1. Cid<strong>

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><p>Cid coughed into his fist. He sounded like he was hacking up a lung. It felt like it, too.<p>

"Hello?" whimpered a thin, scared voice. A child's voice. "Is s-someone out th-there?"

He hated kids. He hated how small and vulnerable and _needy_ they were. Still, he headed towards the whimper without hesitation. "Keep talkin', darlin'. Lemme find you."

"This way. We're… I'm over here."

He heard her correct herself and cursed. He'd seen those little shadow fuckers – Heartless, they were called – ripping people apart left, right and centre. No blood, which was a plus, but dead was still dead.

"This way?"

"Please. I'm scared."

He found her behind a pile of debris. This had been a bedroom. Now it looked like a battlefield. The mattress was overturned, the windows smashed and long lacy curtains billowed from the heat of the fire in the courtyard. The little girl stared at him with dark eyes. He noticed with surprise that, despite her tremulous voice, she wasn't crying.

"He tried to protect me." She gestured to the body beside her. "He came running in and chopped up those monsters, but then fell over and... didn't move again." She held her knees like she'd literally fall apart if she didn't.

The corpse wore a Royal Cadet uniform. He was bloody and facedown. Cid frowned. Blood and a body didn't mean dead today. Gingerly, he turned it over. A wet gasp confirmed his suspicions.

"He ain't dead, darlin', but we will be if'n we don't get outta here."

She stared at him. "But I'm not supposed to leave without my bodyguards." She ducked as if embarrassed. "It's a princess thing. I can take care of myself."

Cid had seen two Wutain men running this way. He also saw the Heartless get them. "They ain't comin'."

"How-"

"No time for pleasantries. You wanna live?"

She nodded.

"Then I'll getcha out."

"How?"

Smart question for a little kid. She couldn't be more than six or seven. He would've expected more screaming and snot. "Gummi Ship." He went to lift the Royal Cadet, but the boy groaned. "Hey, kid. you up for a lil' more heroism?"

The boy took his hands off his face. Cid sucked in a breath. A deep gouge ran diagonally across the teenager's nose and both eyes. His eyelids were just ragged, dangling flesh fringed with useless lashes. No way could he take two steps, let alone get to the hangar where Cid Highwind, Airforce Captain, planned to escape like a rat deserting a sinking ship.

Cid gulped. He couldn't leave the boy, but bringing him meant certain death. Yet the boy had defended the visiting Wutai princess and it had cost him his sight. Could Cid really demand he give up more?

A small hand gripped the boy's slick red palm. "Looks like I get to look out for you now, huh?" the princess said with false cheer. "I used to play-pretend I was a dog. It was a game. I woofed, begged and everything. Just pretend I'm your seeing-eye dog." She looked pleadingly at Cid. "So are we getting out of here or what?"

The boy turned towards Cid's mumble. His face was ghastly, but the way they accepted the situation, without question or pause for their own pain, and put their trust in him, shifted something inside Cid.

"Sure. I'll set the autopilot to take you outta this dump in thirty minutes."

"You're not coming with us?"

"Sure hope to, darlin', but first I'm gonna look for more survivors to take with us."

Cid Highwind was no coward. He would leave no children behind.

….


	2. Aerith: Awakening

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><p><strong>2. Aerith <strong>

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><p>Aerith had never been more frightened in her life. She bit down hard on her lip to keep from screaming. She was alone, she could smell smoke, and the world seemed to be ending outside. She peered out from beneath reams of paper.<p>

Around her, Healer House lay in disarray. Shelves of medical books and scrolls, lovingly preserved over hundreds of generations, had been overturned and scattered. Some were blackened where dropped candles had touched them; others were crumpled and torn from being trampled. Students and mentors had both rushed for the exits when the Heartless came.

All except the smallest student. Aerith had been knocked aside by an older novice struggling with a Heartless and flung under the falling shelves. Luckily, the shelves hadn't crushed her, instead wedging between the wall and a desk too solid to break under the strain. She had been left, unconscious and forgotten beneath everything that had fallen off and covered her.

She crawled out, amazed to still be alive. Her heart thumped against her ribcage and her breath came in quick gasps, as though she had run a marathon. Looking into empty rooms as she went, she staggered to the front door, hoping to see someone she knew.

Leaving Healer House usually meant a trek across the courtyard to the main castle. The healers liked to keep their affairs private and separate from the rest of court, so they had built their home into the giant gnarled roots of the ancient trees at the very edge of the castle grounds. The roots were taller than the nearby stables and thicker than most walls, which made them better than roof-beams and kept everyone toasty warm in winter time.

When the trailing branches were in bloom with blossom in spring, or green with summer leaves, they shielded Healer House and its dormitories almost entirely from sight. Lord Ansem allowed this fierce privacy because no other kingdom had such a prestigious set of healers, let alone those willing to apprentice local kids and pass on their craft to the next generation. After the civil war, Radiant Garden, along with every other kingdom involved, was constantly looking for new ways to establish its place in the new world order. Being home to the most talented healers in the land went a long way to rebuilding the tattered reputation of the once-named 'Strong Bastion'. Though Lord Ansem had renamed the place and spent years revamping it, many people still remembered the way things used to be.

The courtyard was on fire. Flames licked the tree roots, which stood tall and proud against them, but it was only a matter of time before they caught fire too. Nobody was around to put out the blaze. Aerith stared in horror at the destruction. What had _happened_? Where was everyone? The healers had a tiered system. In an emergency, any White Mages not already at the royal ball would have gone to help in the castle – they were the best, after all – but the Red Mages would have stayed with their students. _Someone_ should have been here to stop their home burning down.

_How long was I unconscious?_ Panic rose in Aerith's throat and made her chest feel tight. "What's going on here?" she asked aloud, as if giving voice to the question would make someone magically appear with an answer. Nobody did.

Not knowing what else to do, she set off to look for her friends and teachers.

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><p>.<p> 


	3. Yuffie: Princess

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><p><strong>3. Yuffie<strong>

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><p>Yuffie hadn't even wanted to come on this stupid trip. She was only in this stupid country because stupid Daddy didn't trust her to stay home in the palace in Wutai's capital. He listened to the stupid vizier too much, that was the problem. The vizier made it sound like she was <em>evil<em>, when really all she was guilty of was having fun. Was it her fault other people didn't always get out of the way in time? Could she really be blamed when things went wrong and she was left in the middle of the aftermath, waving cutely and pretending it wasn't going to cost a fortune to fix whatever had broken this time?

At least the vizier couldn't blame her for this. She would never, ever, EVER make up anything as nasty as the Heartless. Her pranks were _funny._ Nobody ever died, either.

She wished the man in the pilot goggles would slow down. She gripped her saviour's hand, but she was too little to drag him properly, and looking out for junk he might fall over slowed them even more. This would be much easier in her regular clothes, but Daddy always made her wear stupid frilly dresses when they visited other courts. Apparently it wasn't appropriate for princesses to wear shorts and tee-shirts, or run around screaming, or eat with their hands, or say hi to anyone below a duke, or...

Her saviour grunted in pain. She looked at him and quickly looked away. His face made her feel nauseous, but she hadn't actually thrown up, which she thought was pretty good. He was really brave, she thought. He wasn't crying, or whimpering, or anything like that. She'd be _bawling_ if their positions were reversed – or maybe not, since his tear ducts weren't where they should be anymore. Every so often he gave a weird half-moan, but considering the damage done by the claws of that last Heartless, she figured that was allowed.

"You kids still there?" Pilot Goggles called over his shoulder.

"How far is it to this hangar place?" Yuffie yelled back.

"Not far now, darlin'."

"My name isn't 'darling'. It's Princess Yuffinella Amirah Suri Himeko of the Eternally Blessed Nation of Wutai."

He stopped for a moment to stare at her.

"But Yuffie is fine. I won't even make you bow or kiss my hand or nuthin'."

"Much obliged, I'm sure," he muttered.

Yuffie swallowed her fear. "Are there… any more of those… Heartless monsters?" she asked tentatively.

Her saviour's grip on her hand tightened. He didn't say anything – he hadn't said much when he followed her screams to her room and saved her then, either – but the feel of his hand was comforting. Which, actually, was totally wrong, because she was meant to be saving him now! He was all cut up and hurting and blinded because of her. It wasn't fair for him to go on comforting her and her not doing anything significant in return.

She bent down and, one-handed, slipped the kunai from the holder around her leg (Daddy may be old-fashioned about dresses, but Wutai was still a nation of ninjas). With the kind of dexterity Radiant Garden kids didn't develop until their teens, she cut off the majority of her skirt.

"Here. Wrap this around your, um, head. Your… eyes," she said awkwardly. "Instead of that pillowcase." He had used it to stanch the blood pouring from his wound, but it was sopping and icky now. Her petticoats would be much more absorbent.

Wordlessly, Pilot Goggles returned to help apply the makeshift bandages. Her saviour had refused to leave behind that big gun-sword weapon he had used on the Heartless, even though there was no way he could use it anymore.

"Thank you," he said – the first words she had heard him speak.

"You're welcome," she said.

"Likewise," added Pilot Goggles, though he sounded uncomfortable saying it. "Now c'mon."

They resumed their flight through the chaos.


	4. Aerith: Escape

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><p><strong>4. Aerith <strong>

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><p>Aerith ran. At her heels, Heartless snapped like rabid dogs. Well, 'snap' was perhaps the wrong verb. The nipped and grabbed with their claws. The hem of her pink novice robes were slashed and her ankles were crisscrossed with cuts. For creatures apparently made of shadows, they were disturbingly solid.<p>

"Help!" she yelled as she ran. "Someone! Anyone! Help me!"

As she passed from one hall to the next, she realised there was nobody left to help her. Either they had been killed – by the Heartless or by other people in their mad rush to get away, as the few pathetic crushed bodies told her – or they had already fled the castle into the city.

She passed by a casement window that looked out over the storage places – great big barns where Lord Ansem's court kept everything from food to retired vehicles waiting to be stripped for scrap metal. The stables and hangars for mechanical transport still in service were on the other side of the grounds, near Healer House. The White Mages had always complained about the noise from airships landing and taking off when they were trying to meditate.

A small group was running towards one of the storage barns. They were the first living people Aerith had seen since she woke up. She checked herself and changed direction, heading away from the Great Hall, where people usually gathered during emergencies so the Royal Guards could defend and lead them to safety. Some of the bodies she had seen wore Royal Guard uniforms, so it seemed likely she would find little help in the Hall. Maybe it was stupid, but she would take her chances with the group outside. Maybe they could help her escape too.

Why had her mentors and the other novices left her behind? Had they thought she was already dead? She hoped that was it. The alternative didn't bear thinking about.

A pair of yellow eyes loomed out of an alcove. She stumbled as the Heartless sprang at her. Her lungs burned from all this running. Healers were a studious lot. Physical training had never been an issue – as long as you wouldn't faint when you used your magic, nobody much cared whether you could run the hundred metres in a minute or less.

She burst out of the servant door and pelted as fast as she could across the cobbles. Behind her, the fire ad spread from courtyard to building and one of the towers flared orange against a perfectly black sky. You couldn't even see the stars anymore. Was that some sort of omen?

_What happened?_ wondered the part of her not solely concerned with survival. _How did all this happen to us?_

She gasped, her knees cracking against the sharp stones as she fell suddenly. She stuck out her own hands to keep from falling on her face. What she saw when she looked behind her made her pounding blood turn ice-cold. A hand gripped her ankle. Swirls of shadow blossomed around it, as the rest of the massive Heartless rose up out of the ground. It had no mouth, so it couldn't leer or snarl, but its eyes burned like the flames around the tower.

Aerith screamed.


	5. Cid: Rescuer

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><p><strong>5. Cid<strong>

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><p>Cid's head jerked up.<p>

"What is it?" asked the princess.

"Get inside, quick." He shoved her the way you weren't supposed to shove royalty, but she didn't reprimand him. "Here, kid." More gently, although that wasn't saying much, he guided the cadet into the co-pilot seat and buckled him in, talking through each action so the kid wouldn't panic at being touched. The last thing Cid needed right now was someone having a freak-out. He was close enough to his own, thank you very much.

"Where do I sit?" the princess asked.

"You don't. You gotta stay here, by the hatch, an' lemme in if I make it back in time. This is the control panel for the door." He pointed at it on the curved inner wall. "This here opens it, this extends the walkway, this retracts it again an' this one here shuts her up tight."

"But…" The princess nibbled her lower lip.

Cid remembered that scream he had heard and turned away from her. "It's all pretty simple. If I don't make it back, the ship is set to take off in thirty minutes." Well, just short of that now, he amended to himself.

He had never flown the Highwind since making the alterations to turn it from a defunct airship into a Gummi Ship, but he knew the electronics for the door and walkway worked. It had been a labour of love, trying to save his first ship from ending up in the scrapheap after the war. She wasn't what she had once been, but he was glad now he had carried on experimenting with the material called 'gummi', which had fallen out of the sky several months ago and flummoxed the court magic-types. It may not be much of a chance, but escaping in the Highwind was the only one they had.

"That's not it!" the princess protested. "I can't reach the panel!" Her little pink pumps, stained with black dust and dirt, made a 'flumph' noise as she jumped to demonstrate. she was several inches shy of the buttons.

"Damn it!" Cid cursed. He looked around, fixed on a toolbox he had been using just yesterday, and dragged it over for her to stand on. The top of the box was narrow and uneven, but to her credit, the kid had perfect balance. "Better?"

"Yeah. You better go see who screamed now." She stared at his shocked expression. "You think I didn't hear it too? Go already!"

Cid shook his head – _Precious brat!_ – but did as he was told.


	6. Aerith: Damsel

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><p><strong>6. Aerith<strong>

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><p>The Heartless exploded in a shower of black dust. Aerith stared at the spot where it had been.<p>

"Are you okay?"

Still shaking, she shifted her gaze to the figure standing behind the drifting dust. If anything, he looked even more shocked than she did. He stared at the sword in his hand like he had never seen it before.

It quickly became apparent that he wasn't the one who had spoken. Another boy jogged up, looking concerned. "Are you hurt?" he asked breathlessly. He, too, carried a sword, but his had a curved blade with a spiked edge. It looked a lot like one of the ceremonial blades she had seen during the welcoming ceremony Lord Ansem threw for the visiting Wutaian royals.

She shook herself out of her stupor and stood up. "I'm fine. Thank you."

"Don't thank me; I was still halfway across the courtyard." He poked the staring boy in the shoulder. "Thank him. I didn't know he could move so fast, but the moment he heard you scream, he was like a greyhound out of a trap." He looked around. "Which we need a repeat of if we're going to get out of here without being barbequed."

"Are there just the two of you?"

The boy's expression, already serious, hardened into stone. His hair was bright blue, but lined with rust-coloured streaks. A cut on his forehead discoloured his skin the same way. "There's nobody else – not that we've seen, anyhow, and we had to come though the servants' quarters to get here. Those corridors are like a maze. Everyone who was anyone was in the Great Hall or on their way to it."

"You don't look like party guests." It was a stupid, vapid thing to say. Aerith immediately regretted it, but he didn't seem to care.

"We'd snuck inside. We," he spoke in a way that told her he hadn't actually had much opinion on the matter, "wanted to see what a royal ball looked like, and dance with some of the girls there. The Heartless struck before the party really got going, but after pretty much everyone had arrived. They were all in one place."

"It was like shooting fish in a barrel." The boy who had saved her shook himself finally and met her eyes. Aerith recognised the jittery blankness there: shock and the effects of trauma. "They didn't stand a chance."

She shivered. Apart from White Mages, healers weren't expected to attend royal events unless it was their turn on paramedic duty. Faces of people she knew flashed through her mind. "You mean they were all-?"

"We gotta move." The boy who had saved her grabbed her arm and started dragging her behind him. "Or we'll end up like them."

"Wait!" she protested. "The storage barns! I saw other people going that way."

"Huh?"

"We're not from the castle," the blue-haired boy explained. "We don't know our way around here."

She nodded and took the lead, turning the grip on her arm into a leading-rein. "This way."

"But –"

"Dude, we don't know the way out, remember?" the blue-haired boy prompted. "Would you rather stay in this place? I know you're a budding pyromaniac, but I'd rather not get burnt to a crisp."

"Oh. Yeah. Sure."

"I'm Aerith," she said, for want of something significant to say. Shocky people needed to keep talking, she knew. She needed to make him focus or he may go into shutdown, and standing motionless in the courtyard right now was a self-imposed death sentence. "What's your name?"

"My name? Uh, it's Lea."

"And I'm Isa," said the blue-haired boy. "Pleased to meet you. Now can we please go faster?"


	7. Lea: Rebel

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><p><strong>7. Lea<strong>

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><p>If he had known that sneaking into the royal ball would end up with him running for his life, Lea was pretty sure he would have stayed home. That wasn't even counting how he and Isa had gotten lost in the labyrinthine servants' corridors, nearly had their hearts pulled out by shadow monsters, and, when they finally <em>did<em> get outside, the serious ick factor involved when he had grabbed the gunblade off a dead guy so he could save some random girl. The girl wasn't even a hottie – based on what he could tell under those voluminous pink robes, that is. He was pretty sure she was under his age range, at any rate.

Weird, the turns your brain took when concentrating on the danger you were facing meant possibly turning into a gibbering wreck.

"Get back!" Isa was suddenly in front of them, halting their progress. He swung his own stolen blade at one of two monsters Lea hadn't even _seen_. Fresh gouts of black dust hit Isa in the face, making him cough. He swung again, blindly, but missed the second one.

Lea moved without thinking, much as he had when he heard the girl scream. It was like when he challenged people to Frisbee matches; his body slipped from move to move without any conscious direction from him.

The gunblade wasn't as easy to manoeuvre as a Frisbee. He preferred projectiles, or at least things he could turn into projectiles. Give him a CD to throw and he could snuff out a candle flame at twenty paces, but a sword was cumbersome and heavy. Still, adrenaline made up for any lack of actual skill. He liked to think the creature looked surprised when its head separated from its body. He also liked to think it hurt the little bastard.

"Lea? Lea!" Someone was shaking him. He blinked rapidly. He had completely zoned out while watching the monster disintegrate. "Lea, we've got to move!"

"Huh?"

"Lea! Quit spacing out on me." Isa shook him harder.

Lea stared at him. "What are they?"

"Does it matter?"

"They don't die, Isa. They just … fall apart. But people have died. A lot of people." Lea's volume rose of its own accord. "_Everyone_ is freaking _dead_! They're just … lying there, all … dead!" He looked down at the gunblade, the tip of which rested between his feet, like it knew he didn't know how to use it and was embarrassed to be seen with him. "I took this off a dead guy. Right out of his _hands_!"

Isa's expression didn't change, but his voice loosened a notch. "Don't freak out on me now, dude." His eyes flicked to the healer girl. "I need you. You think I got this far on my own? You already saved my bacon a bunch of times tonight."

Lea swallowed. His throat felt even drier than the fiery air warranted. "Glad you finally realise you need me."

Something rather like a smile twitched at the corner of Isa's mouth. "That was the part where you were supposed to say how I'd saved your bacon too, moron."

"Um …" The healer girl looked from Isa to Lea and back again. "I'm glad you guys are bonding and having a moment, but the longer we stay still, the more chance there is we'll die or those people will leave without us."

"You think they're leaving?" Isa asked.

"The storage barns have all kinds of things in them, including old vehicles. I can't think why else they'd head there at a time like this."

"_Old _vehicles? How old?"

"Too dangerous to drive around Radiant Garden in anymore."

"Brilliant."

Lea clapped Isa on that back, forcing down his panic under his trademark mask of bravado. "Don't worry. I'll be there to save you again. After all, you admitted that you need me."

"Why you –"

"Nu-uh! No take-backsies!" Lea dashed off, pretending he was used to carrying big-ass weapons.

Isa shook his head. "Good grief. C'mon, uh, Aeris?"

"It's Aerith," she corrected. "And he's going the wrong way."


	8. Kairi: Found

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><p><strong>8. Kairi<strong>

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><p>Kairi was more terrified than she had ever been in her life. She tried to shrink into an even smaller ball and willed herself not to cry. Nonetheless, fat tears slid down her cheeks and small sobs made it past the hands she had clamped over her mouth.<p>

_Granny, where are you?_

It felt like forever ago she had snuck out of bed to see the ladies in their pretty dresses and men in their elegant tuxedoes. Granny had said to stay in bed, like the other kids. There were always at least half a dozen stabled in the bedrooms in the nursery wing. Kairi was the only one with a permanent room, however. She watched the rotation of guests in the others with interest. Lately she had seen a spoiled brat of a prince from Resplendia, twin nine-year-old duchesses from the Dazzle Islands who had a quirky way of talking at the same time, and a princess from Wutai everyone in the Royal Cadets was afraid of because she liked taking stupid risks and getting into trouble so they'd save her.

"They're just lonely," Granny had said when Kairi asked why aristocrat kids always acted so weird. "It's hard to make friends when everyone always tells you exactly what you want to hear."

"I don't understand, Granny."

"It's complicated, honey."

Kairi had blown out a sigh and gone back to turning soil for new seedlings in the window-box. "Everything interesting is complicated. I'm gonna be, like, eleventy-hundred years old before I know all the good stuff."

"Curing loneliness isn't all that hard, honey. It just takes time and effort."

"That's what you said about flowers."

"And are flowers worth it?"

Kairi had contemplated the riot of colour and shape in the window-box that bordered Granny's room on the other side of the castle. Living in the castle meant they couldn't have a proper garden. "I guess."

She wished Granny was here now. Granny could always make her feel safe, no matter what. When the monsters came in her dreams, or her chest tightened in that horrible way, or _anything_, Granny's smile and kind voice could drive away the darkness and make everything better.

Except Granny had gone to the ball, and now Kairi couldn't feel her heart, and the shadow-monsters had come out of her dreams, and she was so _scared_ –

"Hey!"

She scrunched up as small as she could. _I'm not scared. The darkness can't hurt me. I'm not scared. I'm not. They're just dreams. Granny said they're just dreams. I'm not scared. I'm not –_

"Hey there." Someone was blocking the triangle of light where the two sides of the broken table met. Kairi briefly saw an eye, which disappeared seconds before the table began to shift.

"Hey, whoa! _Whoa!_ What d'ya think you're doing, yo?"

"There's a little kid trapped under there."

"Seriously? And you think collapsing the entire friggin' pile of rubble is gonna help him?"

"Her."

"Whatever. Here, let me – nggh!"

The table began to shift again. Things flaked off and hit Kairi in the face – black dust and other stuff she didn't want to think about.

"Quick, grab the other side!" instructed the second voice. "If you can handle it with your girly-ass muscles."

"Put a sock in it, pretty-boy."

The triangle of light widened until it was as big as a rabbit hole, and then bigger still. Grunts of effort accompanied the incremental opening.

"Quick, kid," said the first voice, not soft this time but strained. "We can't hold this long. Get out before… we can't…"

Kairi didn't need to be told twice. She scrambled. Seconds after she reached open air, her hidey-hole caved in. if she had still been inside, she would have been crushed. She shivered. Someone put a blanket over her. No, she realised, not a blanket, but a blazer-jacket thing. She looked up into the face of a girl with tangled auburn curls and cut on her forehead.

"Are you all right?"

Kairi couldn't stop shaking enough to nod or shake her head.

"Shock," said the girl.

"No shit," said the second voice, which apparently belonged to a gangly boy with the longest ponytail Kairi had ever seen.

"Don't cuss in front of a little kid!"

"Like bad language is the worst thing in her life right now?" he said derisively.

The girl ignored him. "What's your name?" she asked instead.

Kairi drew the jacket tighter around her. The boy wore one just like it, but the girl had only a white shirt speckled with flecks of red. Lots of flecks. "K-Kairi."

"I'm Cissnei."

"Reno," said the boy. "Or 'sir'."

"Or 'asshole'," Cissnei said under her breath. "Don't worry, sweetie, we'll look after you now."

Reno snorted. His next words made Kairi want to tunnel back under the wreckage. "But who's gonna look out for us?"


	9. Cid: Desperate

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><p><strong>9. Cid <strong>

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><p>Cid spotted the three figures running towards him before they saw him. That was chiefly because they were practically running backwards, so they could better see the horde of Heartless charging after them.<p>

"Shit!" he cursed. "Over here!"

One wearing what looked like a pink dressing gown turned to see him. It was a girl. Her face was streaked with Heartless dust and tears. "That way!" she yelled at the other two. "Hurry!"

Cid levelled one of the weapons he had picked up from the storage shed. Technically, it was a prototype that never got past the beta-testing stage and was too dangerous to use. It was also an ugly sonovobitch that looked like a cross between a blunderbuss and a laser rifle by way of a food processor, but it had enough destructive power and radius for his needs. If it blew off his hands he wouldn't care for long. The Heartless would be on him if he didn't stop them first.

"Get down!" he thundered.

"Are you kidding?" demanded the boy inefficiently swinging a gunblade.

"NOW!" Cid used his best drop-and-give-me-twenty voice.

As one, the three figures dropped to the cobbles.

Cid squeezed the trigger. The energy cell on top of the weapon flared briefly before unleashing its charge. The kickback from the blast of electric-blue energy nearly took him off his feet. He transferred his weight onto his back leg, gritted his teeth and held steady. He even managed to sweep the shot from side to side, just enough to disintegrate the Heartless about to make a meal of the three now kissing dirt.

With a hiss, the cell died. Cid lowered the weapon. He counted three quaking heads, slightly singed, but still intact. He even still had his own hands. "Move it!" he shouted.

"We stopped and dropped. Aren't we supposed to roll now?"

"Lea, shut up."

Cid took a few steps, but they covered the distance to him pretty good on their own. Two boys and a girl, all dirty, breathless and wide-eyed in their own way. A manic gleam in the redhead's eyes made Cid automatically peg him as one to watch. He recognised a powder-keg when he saw one. Cid could now see that what he had thought was a dressing gown was actually a healer robe, which made the girl valuable. His brain flashed to the cadet and his ruined eyes. The boy with blue hair looked weirdest of all, but seemed most stable. He stared expectantly at Cid.

"Introductions later," Cid snapped. "We got less than twenty-five minutes before we're stuck in this hellhole with no escape route."

"You have a way out?" the girl asked. "Can't you wait a little while? We need to see if there are any more survivors. We barely had a chance to look –"

"Ain't no time, sweet-cheeks." Cid hardened his voice. Maybe if he played the part enough, he wouldn't feel like such a bastard. It had always worked before. "I got one ticket outta here. I can take as many as can get to my ship in," he consulted his watch, "twenty-two minutes. After that it's g'night an' don't let the door hit ya on the way out."

Her expression was woeful. She dropped her eyes, almost not speaking to him at all. "But my friends … my teachers …"

"I _especially_ need you to get on board my ship, girlie."

"Me? Why me?"

"You're a healer, right?"

"Um, kind of. I'm an apprentice –"

"Well we got us a real bad medical emergency already belted into one o' the premium seats." Cid's attempt at levity fell flatter than a shadow on concrete. He jerked a thumb over his shoulder and gave them clipped instructions on how to reach the Highwind.

"You aren't coming too?" enquired the blue-haired boy, raising one equally blue eyebrow. He hadn't volunteered his name. none of them had. The redhead was still full of adrenaline and the healer girl too full of her own thoughts to remember introductions, but Cid got the feeling this one had deliberately witheld the information. He reminded Cid of stray dogs he used to watch when he was in private lodgings, before he joined the Air Force. Those critters used to peer around the corner by the butcher's shop, mouths watering at the smell of meat every time something got tossed in the trash out back, but too wary to go ahead and take it. Those dogs had been kicked too many times to rush in blindly. This kid had the same wary patience, which set him apart from the burning chaos around them.

He shook off the unwanted memories. He had been a different person back then and there were more pressing things to think about right now. No time for strolls down Memory Lane tonight. "I got twenty minutes an' I reckon you ain't the only waif an' strays need pickin' up. You can make it back to the ship without me."

The redhead gave a wicked smile. "And what are we supposed to write on your headstone if you don't make it back in time?"

"Cid Highwind."

"Captain Cid Highwind?" echoed the blue-haired boy. "_The_ Captain Highwind? Head of the Air Force Cadets? The Cid Highwind who used to be Chief Mechanical Engineer of the Airborne Military Research Division?"

"Reckon that wouldn't all fit on a tombstone, kid." Cid turned on his heel, surreptitiously checking the charge on his unnamed weapon. He had enough for one more blast. He hoped. "Now get to it. An' don't touch nuthin' on or near the controls! Autopilot'll take care of everythin' if worst comes to worst." He strode off without looking back.

"But –" the girl started.

Cid kept walking. All the fancy titles and inglorious pasts in the world didn't matter when it was you versus flames, darkness and your own fear. He wouldn't have any gravestone, but if he did, he knew what it should say:

_Here Lies Cid Highwind._

_He tried his best._

_He failed a lot._

_What a dumbass._


	10. Cissnei: Protector

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><p><strong>10. Cissnei<strong>

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><p>The little girl in Cissnei's arms shivered almost uncontrollably. Cissnei couldn't blame her. If not for all the adrenaline coursing through her, she might have given in to a case of the shakes, too. Instead, she held the girl tighter and hoped Reno was as good as he said he was.<p>

"Best cadet in the whole programme," he snorted. "Sureshot Award winner."

_Yeah,_ she thought privately_, for one semester out of nine. _The other eight had been Squall's victories. Reno had only gained his moment of glory when the class protégé was too sick to compete. Who knew a person could be so allergic to shellfish?

Reno cocked his gunblade. "I'll cover you."

"Gee, I feel so reassured."

He ignored her sarcasm for once. "Where are we running to?"

Cissnei fumbled for an answer, but the little girl did it for her. "That way," she whispered.

"Huh?" Cissnei said intelligently.

The girl pointed. "We should go that way."

Cissnei exchanged a look with Reno. "Why that way?"

"Hearts."

Reno's eyebrows raised almost into his fiery red hairline. They disappeared somewhere under the goggles he insisted on wearing to piss off the instructors. Goggles were meant to be the trimming on an Air Force Cadet, not a Royal Guard. Reno just loved stirring up trouble for the hell of it. That might be another reason why he wasn't a real contender for Squall's crown, no matter how much he claimed otherwise.

"Don't you mean 'Heart_less_'?" he asked.

The little girl shook her head and buried her face in Cissnei's shoulder. "There's nobody else left," she sobbed, her voice like a bubble popping on the surface of an oily pool. "Only the ones that way. They're all … all … my Granny is …" Her voice thinned to a wail. Cissnei dusty shoulder grew damp as her lapel crumpled in the girl's fist. "I don't wanna die. I don't want anyone else to die."

"Hush," Cissnei said awkwardly. She wasn't the maternal type. She was the more the bust-your-balls-while-they're-still-attached type. She raised her eyes to Reno, who shrugged.

"You got a better idea?"

"Don't die?" she tried.

"Good plan. Simple yet effective. Lacks a little on the details, though."

A black head studded with yellow eyes rose out of the ground at his feet. He yelped and slashed at it. Each eye went in a different direction. A second later the split head exploded into dust that coated him from head to foot. He blew out a small cloud and coughed like he was trying to hork up a lung.

"We'll figure out the details as we go," he wheezed.


	11. Yuffie: Scared

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><p><strong>11. Yuffie<strong>

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><p>Yuffie balanced precariously on the toolbox, gesturing for the three teenagers to come inside quickly. "Hurry up!" she yelled, managing to put two syllables into 'up'. "Or they're gonna get you!"<p>

"Yeah, because we didn't figure that out on our own," snapped the redhead boy. He leaped on board like a big orange cat. "Shut the door."

"No," she protested when he tried to shove her aside to press the button. "There's still ten minutes before the autopilot takes off. I'm not shutting this door until Mr. Cid comes back!"

"She's right, Lea," said the boy with blue hair. "We need him."

"Says who?"

"Says common sense. This is his ship. He'd be a better chance at survival right now than some autopilot."

The boy called Lea grumbled, but acquiesced. Yuffie breathed a sigh of relief – and another when the girl clambered on board, hoisting her robes over her knees and blowing bangs from her eyes. She looked around and headed straight for Yuffie's saviour without bothering to introduce herself.

"I'm a healer," she said as she knelt by his side. "My name's Aerith. Now hold still. This might tingle a bit."

Yuffie's saviour turned his head at the girl's voice and jumped when she took his hand, but he didn't try to lash out or scramble away. His seatbelt would have prevented that anyway. The cloth around his eyes was stained so red it was almost black. Yuffie's stomach rolled, but the healer girl just hung on and closed her eyes. A faint greenish glow manifested above her head. She scrunched up her face and it leeches down, through the crown of her skull, down her arms and into her hands. His hands started to glow too, mirroring hers as she transferred her magic into him. Slowly, it travelled up his arms, across his torso, and along the lines of his neck and jaw.

Suddenly the entire ship rocked. Yuffie squealed. The force of it flung her off her perch. She slammed into the blue-haired boy and they both went crashing into the healer girl. Her hand ripped free and the green glow died before it reached the Royal Cadet's eyes.

"What was that?" demanded Lea. "What the hell was that?"

A dark blue mouth pressed itself against the door, but the huge body to which it was attached prevented the gigantic Heartless from entering. It pulled back, revealing a black, spherical body streaked with dark blue like alien blood spatter. Its glowing yellow eyes were piggish and small, but the jagged, toothy mouth made up for its unfortunate appearance. Three thick tentacles with frayed pink tips sprouted out of its body and reached into the ship like a cat pawing at a mouse-hole. Yuffie tried to crawl away, but one tentacle wrapped around her ankle and dragged her towards the door.

"No!" she screamed. "Help! Help me, please!" As she went past the overturned toolbox, she snatched up a saw and chopped awkwardly at the horrid grasping thing. "Help meee!"

"Shit!" The redhead ran past her and jabbed wildly with his gunblade. The tip went straight into the Heartless's mouth. It looked surprised for a moment, then quivered and exploded into dust. He yanked Yuffie to her feet. "You owe me, kid."

"You can collect your reward if we survive," she replied. "And thank you."

He grumped, but his face quickly lost all expression. "Shiiiiit."

Yuffie followed his gaze. If her father had allowed cussing, she would have let loose her own. A dozen similar yellow-eyed spheres were headed their way, scudding across the ground like bombs looking for a target. The ship juddered, signaling another one on the roof. Yuffie refused to cry, but she was close. Fear made her tummy twisty and adrenaline made her head fell light, like she had been spinning too long on a merry-go-round.

"Mr. Cid," she murmured. "Where are you?"


	12. Cid: Distracted

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><p><strong>12. Cid<strong>

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><p>Cid's patience, which had the tensile strength of putty, finally snapped. He picked up speed to keep ahead of the army of wriggling black bodies. There were too many to count, popping out of things and reaching for him. He was forced to duck and stumbled several times. One latched onto his ankle until he swiped it off with his useless energy rifle. Its battery cell spent, it had become just a fancy club.<p>

He almost stopped when he saw the gigantic ball-like Heartless attacking the Highwind. Thin screams emanated from within. Unthinkingly reacting to the terror of a child, he thundered towards the craft, roaring like a bear with a backside full of bee-stings.

One of the creatures turned. It boomed in the manner of a cruise liner and rolled to face him. Three pink-tipped tentacles snaked towards him. It was testament to years of training and service, plus the motivational power of adrenaline, that he evaded all three, coming up inside the thing's defences. Cid jumped and stabbed the barrel down like a blade. The creature's 'skin', for want of a better word, bowed inwards. For a moment it looked like it would repel him like a bullet hitting a rubber sheet, but something tore and it exploded. Cid hit the ground, coughing on black dust.

"Mr. Cid!"

Feet landed next to him and hands helped him up and into the ship. Cid wiped dust from his eyes and saw that the kids he had found earlier had made it back. The red and blue-haired boys peered at him expectantly, while Yuffie puttered behind them, trying to shove her way through.

"Mr. Cid, she's hurt!"

"Who?" he wheezed.

"The healer girl. She hit her head. She won't wake up!"

Shit. Shit, shit, and triple _shit_! "Show me."

It was true: a bundle of pink robes signalled where she had fallen, apparently trying to shield the blinded cadet. An emerging purple bruise on her temple looked nasty; more than enough to conk her out and probably cause a concussion to boot. Cid was reminded of the fact that healers, in a twist of fate nobody appreciated, could not heal themselves. He cussed her family line right back to her grandpappy for not breeding her with a tougher skull, then scooped her up and strapped her into a chair. It probably wasn't the most medically sound thing to do, but it beat letting her slide all over the floor as they took off.

And they had to take off. They were out of time and options.

"Get buckled in," he ordered. "All of ya. NOW!"

The redhead immediately obliged. The blue-haired boy helped lift Yuffie into a seat, for which Cid was grateful. It gave him leeway to hustle to the cockpit and do his thing.

"Kid, get that door shut!"

"I can do it!" Yuffie struggled free of her helper to complete the task Cid had set her earlier. She jumped up and down to reach the controls, but without his toolbox to stand on she was too short.

The blue-haired boy came over, but paused before hitting the button. "There's people!" he yelled. "They're still out there, heading this way."

The engines ground to life. The controls lit up and started giving Cid readings that weren't great, but were good enough. He looked over his shoulder. "How close?" Tough decision time. Stay to help and possibly be killed, or head off and know forever that he had left people to die when they were in sight of help? _Please don't make me leave someone behind._

In answer, the boy leaned out and yelled: "Hurry up!" He yanked his head back in when a sphere-Heartless tentacle tried to grab his throat and pull him through. "Whoa!"

"Here!" His buddy slid his gunblade towards him. A plume of black dust heralded another Heartless dispatched. "Leave them – they're dead already."

The ship started to lift off, hatch still open and walkway extended.

"Close the door!" the redhead yelled, panic in his voice. "Close the damn door, Isa!"

"Wait!" screamed a high-pitched voice from outside. "Please, wait!"

"Don't go, you bastards!"

Something heavy and probably Heartless-shaped thumped against their side, nearly sending them back to the ground. Cid veered left. Sparks flew from the walkways as it scraped the ground. Out the corner of his eye, he saw two teenagers running alongside the Highwind, one carrying a little kid in her arms. They were too far away! He took a reckless chance and swerved closer, hoping he wouldn't accidentally turn them into red smears along their flank. Or maybe that would be better than leaving them for the Heartless.

"Mr. Cid," Yuffie suddenly screamed, pointing at the windshield he was neglecting to look through. "Look out!"


End file.
